Title: President and chief operating officer of ParkerVision, based in Jacksonville, Fla.
Background: Prior to joining ParkerVision in 1998, Mr. Sisisky spent 10 years as managing director of the Shircliff Group, a firm specializing in mergers, acquisitions and business valuations. When ParkerVision was founded in 1989, it developed robotic cameras. The company has since changed its focus to a broadcast-centric model. Its core product is PVTV Studio News, a hardware and software solution that allows one person to control a broadcast.
Web vision: Next year, ParkerVision plans to introduce a version of its PVTV product geared for the Web, PVTV WebStation for News. The system allows stations to automatically create a broadcast version and an Internet version of the same newscast. “There are two things missing from TV Web sites,” Mr. Sisisky said. “One is TV news. It’s expensive to produce the first time and even more expensive to encode and produce on the Web a second time. And two is revenue. No one has been able to figure out how to monetize the content.” Since PVTV Studio News demarcates the beginning and end of each segment, the content produced for air can be repurposed for the Web at essentially no additional cost, he said. “You can skip what you want and pick what you want for the Web,” he said. The company will beta test the product with the Jacksonville Fox affiliate WAWS-TV this fall. PVTV WebStation works in concert with PVTV Studio News or as a stand-alone system.
The bottom line: Broadcasters need to find ways to save money, Mr. Sisisky said, and the PVTV systems allow them to produce news with fewer people and grow their Web presence with little additional costs. For example, WWTI-TV in Watertown, N.Y., began using PVTV Studio News earlier this year and quadrupled its news output from 10 30-minute shows per week to 39 per week with no additional technical staff needed, Mr. Sisisky said. PVTV Studio News ranges from $175,000 to $600,000. WebStation pricing will be based on a licensing model-with a revenue sharing structure tilted toward the broadcaster.
Future developments: Within one to three years, Mr. Sisisky expects the PVTV line of products will enable TV stations to repurpose their content, link ads to stories online and perform billing and traffic functions.